


A Hard Day's Night

by Beguile



Category: Daredevil (TV), The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: "The Devil is Obsessed With Me", A Server Who Has Seen It All, Aggressive Pettiness, Cocaine, Head Injury, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Pie, broken ribs, diner, late night, mission gone awry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:07:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26169907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beguile/pseuds/Beguile
Summary: The shitty little truck stop diner has seen worse than both of them.One-shot.
Relationships: Frank Castle & Matt Murdock
Comments: 20
Kudos: 120
Collections: Daredevil and Defenders Exchange 2020





	A Hard Day's Night

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: the characters and concepts in this story are the property of Marvel and their related affiliates. This is an amateur writing effort meant for entertainment purposes only.
> 
> Title is taken from the Beatles’ song. 
> 
> Written for eazlby on Tumblr as part of the Daredevil Exchange. One prompt called for “Unlikely [temporary] allies sharing an early breakfast at a truck stop diner after a long mission gone sideways straight to hell.” Special thanks to Dichotomy Studios for beta-ing.  
> Enjoy!

* * *

The shitty little truck stop diner has seen worse than both of them. Guy at the counter has a mug in worse shape than Frank’s and more caustic disposition than Matt. Their server introduces herself as Hattie. She pours them each a cup of a coffee, puts down some menus, and starts talking about pie flavours like it’s not an ungodly hour in the morning, like they’re not some of the most suspicious diner patrons ever to grace one of her booths.

Frank wears it better than Matt. His leg’s rattling under the table. The surface of the coffee in his mug ripples, and the thud of his heel is out of sync with the oldies droning out of the radio behind the counter. But he maintains composure from the waist up by folding his hands in front of him and squeezing them into one giant fist. “Just the coffee, thank you,” he says in a rush.

Matt is still turned mostly towards the wall, trying to accommodate the brokenness of his ribs. There’s a wound on the side of his scalp that needs hiding too. He can feel blood collecting in the upturned collar of his stolen wool jacket, the jacket that barely covers the bright red of his armour. “He’ll have a water, please,” he adds.

Hattie asks if they would like some time with the menus, effectively covering up the angry muttering Frank is doing from the far side of the booth.

“No,” Matt says, “Just the-“

“Yes, please,” Frank speaks over him. “Thank you, Ma’am.”

She leaves them to it.

Frank tightens his grip so fiercely Matt can hear the tendons popping out of his skin. “No? Fucking no? What the hell is your problem, no? This was your idea.”  
  
“Calm down.”

Frank smacks the edge of the table and points a finger at Matt. “I am calm. Don’t tell me to be calm. I am calm.”

Matt reaches across the table and gets the coffee cup out of the way. Frank picks up a menu, muttering to himself. “Telling me to calm down. This was your idea, Red. Your stupid idea. This whole night is your stupid idea.” He flaps the menu up and down against the table, unable to hold it or himself still. Eventually, he gives up, slapping the page down and putting his hands back together in front of him. “Where is she? The server?”

“She just left.”  
  
Frank’s hands knock against the table. He stares out the window towards the great, big darkness beyond, his heart hammering in his chest so hard he might bruise a rib. “Stupid. Absolutely stupid.”  
  
Matt tosses back one of the coffees, grateful his sense of smell is still gone so he doesn’t have to taste the watery, sludgy brew. He restacks the menus on the edge of the table for the server when she gets back.

Frank bounces his leg so hard it hits the tabletop, knocking the menus askew.

“Couldn’t stop it, sorry,” he says, fully able to stop it and not sorry at all, actually. His leg keeps moving under the table.

Matt picks up the second cup of coffee. Taste like shit or not, he knows Frank wants coffee more than water at the moment. “How’s your heart doing?” he asks.

“Ah, Jesus, here we go,” Frank says.

“Better not get worked up, Frank. Would hate to give you compressions,” Matt takes a sip of the coffee he can barely taste, “ _Again_.”

“One more stupid idea you’ve had tonight. I didn’t need compressions. I was doing fine.”

“You were having a heart attack.”  
  
“I’ll show you a-“

Hattie returns at that moment, putting a glass of water down in front of Frank. He makes no effort to grab it, his hands still locked in a death grip on each other. More things Hattie doesn’t notice or are simply standard practice at the diner. Matt can’t help turning away from his left side in mild awe as she asks, “What’ll it be?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Frank says. “My friend here stacked the menus before I could have a look. Would you mind telling me about your specials, please?”  
  
“Well, let’s see-“  
  
Matt interjects, his head _pounding_. “We’ll have the pie.”  
  
“He’ll have the pie. I want to hear about the specials.” Frank lets out a good-natured chuckle. “Honestly, he brings me to this place. This was his idea, and he isn’t even gonna let me order.”

“Just order,” Matt snaps, hanging his head to the left so the blood doesn’t pulse quite so fiercely in his skull. Frank’s heel tapping and heart pounding are not helping.

“Well, let’s see,” Hattie says, thinking about it. “We got a breakfast plate, some sandwiches-“

“Oh, sandwiches,” Frank says with obviously feigned interest. At Matt.

Matt picks up the other cup of coffee and chugs it back, pushing both empty mugs towards Hattie. “While he’s thinking, can I get another cup of coffee?”

“Sure,” Hattie says, heading off to get the pot.

As soon as she’s gone, Matt sets his attention fully on Frank. “Eat something.”  
  
“Not hungry.” The ball of Frank’s fists is bouncing on the table.

“Look, I’m sorry. Is that what you want me to say? That I’m sorry?”  
  
“Oh, Jesus, what the hell are you? Seven? No. What I want – what I really want – is for you to get the hell out of my way. I want you to stop following me. I want you to stop busting into my safehouses. I want you to stop _obsessing_ over me.”  
  
“Right, because I’m the one who’s obsessed!”

“Keep your voice down.”

“Who was really following who tonight, Frank?”  
  
Hattie returns to the table and refills one of the coffees. “Now, let’s see, where’d I get to in those specials?”  
  
Matt stares in disbelief, listening to her heartrate, her breathing, the way she moves, and everything about her, every single detail, points to her absolutely not caring about who they are or what they’re doing.

“I’ll have a sandwich,” Frank says after a beat, obviously in disbelief himself.

“What kind? We got chicken salad, egg salad, club-“

“Club.”  
  
“Great,” she takes the menus with her this time. “You let me know you need anything else.”  
  
The empty space she leaves behind seethes at the end of the table. Matt plays with the lapels of his jacket, feeling the chest on his armour, the upraised lines from the Ds clearly visible to anyone and everyone without looking too hard. Frank, too, shifts in his seat, his leg falling still for the first time as his heart rages on his chest.

He brushes at his neck and the sides of his head, the fine mist of white powder clouding in the air. “Shit,” he says, inhaling some. Again. 

Too late for Matt, who recognizes the distinct lack of smell and the sharp sour tang on his gums as a sign that he shouldn’t be breathing and Frank shouldn’t be patting himself down right now. He leans back in his seat, head spinning. A dizzying count to ten and third cup of coffee later sees him steadied. Now it’s his leg rattling under the table, his hands knocking on the tabletop.

Hattie reappears. “What kind of pie did you want again?”  
  
Matt waits for Frank to respond only to realize it’s him who ordered the pie. “Oh, uh…your choice.”

“What kind of pie did you say there was again?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Matt says, willing Frank to _shut up_.

“I don’t think you did tell us, now that I’m remembering correctly.”  
  
“Apple,” Matt says. Anything to end this exchange. His left ear is ringing.

“All out of apple, I’m afraid,” Hattie says. “But we do have blueberry, raspberry, and some banoffee left.”  
  
“Blueberry, then.”

Frank’s leg starts jumping again. He untangles his hands, shakes them out at his sides. “You know some raspberry sounds good too. I’ll have a piece of that.”

“You said you didn’t want pie,” Matt points out.

“Well, now I do.” He turns to Hattie and pours all the warmth and sugar into his voice that he can. “A piece of raspberry, ma’am. Thank you.”  
  
“You want ice cream with that?”

“Yeah, I would. Hey, Red, you want ice cream with yours?”  
  
Matt can’t believe this. Frank can’t believe it either, but maybe that’s the lingering tachycardia. “Yeah,” Matt says, “Sure.”  
  
“Okay,” Hattie says, leaving the table again.

Quietly, so that she can’t hear him, even though Matt’s pretty sure she wouldn’t care if she could: “How is she…? Can she not see us?”  
  
“I have no idea,” Frank says. “She must get weirder people in here than me and you.”  
  
“Who the hell would come in here weirder than me and you?”  
  
Frank gives a small sound, almost like a laugh. “I don’t know.”  
  
“You think she’s calling the cops now?”  
  
“She better not. I really want that pie.”

The sound Frank makes is more like a laugh this time. Matt gives one too, the absurdity of the whole night dawning on him. In his armour, head wound still bleeding and broken ribs aching, ordering sandwiches, coffee, and pie from an all-night greasy spoon with the Punisher, and somehow this is as normal for their server as it is for them.

He listens and Frank’s heart has slowed. Still too fast for a cup of coffee, but Matt takes care of that. He can use all the coffee in the world to keep his head wound from putting him out cold. “Look, about tonight,” he says.

“Yeah, you’re sorry,” Frank chides him.

Matt beams wickedly. “No, I’m not.”

“I know.” And just so they’re clear: “I’m not either. Trying to take down a coke-smuggling ring on your own, unarmed, no fucking wonder the guys got the jump on you.”  
  
“They got the jump on me because you started shooting.”  
  
“I started shooting because they got the jump on you.”

“So you admit that you were there because of me.”

“I was there. And you’re God damn lucky I was.”  
  
“You’re right, Frank.”  
  
“Damn straight, I am.”  
  
“Thank you for following me.”  
  
“Oh, for fu-“

“And for shooting at the people who were trying to kill me.”  
  
“Who would have killed you, I wasn’t there.” Frank puts his hands back on the table, and Matt thinks he’s about to leave. But Frank hangs his head and takes a few deep breaths, his heart in his throat, hammering away like it’s struck gold. Frank grips his upper chest and rises back to sitting, breathing through the frantic rhythm.

Matt pushes the water towards him. Frank takes it without a word and downs the entire contents of the cup, putting it back at the edge of the table for a refill. Drinking helps get his heart back on track. “Course you had to ruin that too. Just love putting yourself in the way of a bullet.”

“Especially when you’re around,” Matt says. He loses the smirk, frustration with Frank finally giving away to something softer. “You okay?”  
  
“Don’t get sweet on me, Red.”  
  
“Not sweet. I gotta know that you’re okay, Frank. Your heart’s going awfully fast.”  
  
“I’m fine,” Frank replies. He reaches a hand up to scrub at his head before remembering there’s still cocaine clinging to the bristles of his hair. He lowers his hand back to his side. “Worst of it’s over.”  
  
Matt gives a nod, accepting that as the truth. He didn’t get nearly as much as Frank, mostly because Frank was there, knocking him out of the line of fire and the spray of powder.

“Thank you,” Matt says.

Frank grumbles something that’s about to build to a longer rant, but Hattie’s back at the table. “Clubhouse sandwich,” she says, putting it in front of Frank, “And a slice of raspberry and blueberry pie. You boys need anything else?”  
  
“No, thanks,” Frank says before Matt can.

“A refill,” Matt says, gesturing to Frank’s cup.

Hattie dutifully goes off to get the water pitcher.

Frank pushes at the sandwich on his plate a little, checking out the contents. Matt can’t smell, nor is Frank’s heart rate a reliable guide, so he has no idea what the quality of the food is. He brings the pie directly in front of him and pokes at it with a fork, impressed when it doesn’t give way entirely to mush. No wonder Hattie recommended it first.

She returns and refills the cup for Frank. “Leave the pitcher,” Matt says, “Please.”  
  
“Sure thing,” she says. “You boys holler, you need anything else.”

Then she’s gone again. Whether she knows who they are or not, she knows enough not to hover. Frank’s heart skips a beat from either his tachycardia or his being impressed. Maybe both. He picks up one half of his sandwich and starts eating.

The fact that Frank’s eating prompts Matt’s own stomach into action. He is hungry. Dizzy, yeah, distantly, and a little nauseated, but part of that is the sudden drop in adrenaline, the frenzy of the night giving way to a meal in almost companionable quiet. The first bite of pie doesn’t taste like anything except sweet.

The bells jingle over the door. A few more people step inside. Hattie’s heart tells Matt nothing about their appearance, but Frank’s quickens inside his chest. Matt’s own starts doing a little dance when he picks up on pieces of their conversation. “Devil” and “Punisher” and “kicked their asses” all come up in rapid succession. They’ve got voices running the way Frank’s respiration did as Matt give him compressions, words almost in a traffic jam. Chemical excitement fills the air in a cloud of nothing, sheer nothing. Scentless as the powder clinging to Frank’s neck and shoulders.

Matt puts down his fork. Frank stops eating his sandwich. He reaches into his pocket for a couple crumpled bills. “Get her and the cook and the guy at the counter in the kitchen,” he says even though he doesn’t need to. Matt’s already reaching for his helmet.

“Still think I ruin everything?” Matt asks, pulling his coat off his shoulders.

“You do,” Frank says, rising from his side of the booth.

Matt pulls on his mask, laughing. “It was my idea to come here.”

Frank tries to walk past him, but Matt falls into step at his side.

* * *

Happy reading!


End file.
